Chapter 18: The science of magic
As I was getting near the Cloven Academy, an idea popped in my head and I jumped off Zephyr, canceling the spell. I sprinted the remaining distance, soon reaching the gate of the academy.
I saw that the guards immediately started chanting as I was getting close to the gate. Once they finished casting, fireballs appeared over their hands, pointed towards me, as one of them said out loud.
"If you come any closer, we'll attack!"
I was confused and just about to ask them what is going on, when Senna said in my mind.
[Haha. Maybe take your mask off before trying to enter guarded places.]
I finally realized what was going on. Sighing, I took my mask off before lifting my hands in a surrender motion and saying out loud.
"Sorry about that, I forgot about the mask. I'm Ethan Knott and I'm here to visit Miss Anise Cloven."
The guards looked at me for a good moment before the one who spoke earlier canceled the fireball and said to me in a polite tone:
"Ethan, you are free to enter. Next time, please remember to take the mask off before coming here, or you might get attacked on the spot."
Finally obtaining permission, I thanked the two guards and started walking inside. The other guard was still holding the fireball but didn't move to stop me, just looking my way with caution. As I was passing them, I heard the other guard reassure the first one that it was okay, since he saw me visiting the academy before.
Leaving the gate, I made my way through the academy grounds. The place seemed a lot more empty than it was the last time I was here. After reaching Anise's quarters and knocking on the door, I waited for a moment, but there was no answer. I knocked a couple more times, but seeing no difference I mumbled to myself: "She should be inside the academy, or the guards won't let me enter. Maybe she has classes?"
As I reached this conclusion, I made my way out of the dormitory and looked for someone to ask about where to find Anise. Immediately after I passed through the doors out of the building, I almost stumbled into a frail looking guy, approximately the same age as my avatar. I was about to apologize when he looked at me with an unfriendly expression and said: "Can't you look where you are going? Get out of the way." Before continuing past me.
I was confused about why that guy was so rude, but I just chose to ignore him and started asking other people around about where I could find Anise, only to get shushed away by most of them.
'Why is everyone so rude around here?' I asked myself as I walked towards a kid in simple gray clothes, ten years old or so, that was crouching in front of a door. When the kid noticed me walking in front of him, he got up in a startled manner and said while stuttering:
"Do you need anything?"
I was a bit amused by his behavior and said: "Am I that scary? I just wanted to ask you a question."
The kid shook his head and answered with the same stutter. "No, sir. You are not scary at all. What do you need?"
A chuckle escaped my lips as I asked with a smile: "Do you know where I could find Anise Cloven? I tried her living quarters but she was not there."
The kid pointed towards a big building a bit in the distance and said: "All students have classes over there."
"I see. Thanks for the info." I replied and turned around. I heard a sigh of relief escape his lips as I walked away, making the smile on my lips grow larger. As I walked towards the building the kid pointed to, Senna's voice sounded in my head.
[*That kid is probably a slave.*]
I frowned when I heard her words and asked: "How do you know?"
[*Call it instinct. The way he was looking towards the ground and avoided making eye contact, his stammering, the simple clothes and the fear that seemed to be engraved into his very soul, all screamed slave behavior to me.*]
"I didn't know this world had slaves. Too bad, he looked like a good kid."
[*Every words has slaves, in one form or another.*]
I was intrigued by her answer, but didn't ask her about it because I reached the building the kid pointed me to. I approached the stern looking guard at the door and said:
"Excuse me, I'm here to look for Miss Anise Cloven."
The guard looked at me for a moment before replying: "She is inside, but if you are not a student of the academy you will have to wait for classes to end."
"Do you know how long will that take?" I had no problem waiting for classes to end, but if it took too long I might as well go and complete the quest in Cloven City before returning here later.
"It should take around two more hours."
I nodded and was about to take my leave when the doors behind the guard opened and a woman whose features closely resembled Anise walked out. The only difference was her eyes which, instead of the deep black color, were completely white. She looked like Anise's older sister, but Anise didn't really speak that much of her family and I wasn't sure if I was right.
The guard sat straight when the woman appeared and said: "Headmistress.".
'Her mom?' I was so shocked I almost blurted the words out. The woman nodded towards the guard and was about to pass by, when I asked:
"Excuse me, are you perhaps Miss Anise's mother?"
She woman turned towards me with an indifferent expression and said: "I am indeed, and who might you be?"
I bowed towards her and said: "I'm a friend of hers. My name is Ethan Knott."
She looked me up and down and said: "The summon boy?"
'Summon boy? Really?…' "Yes, I am the one summoned into this world by her."
She nodded, her expression still cold and indifferent like before as she said: "I see. You did a few favors for the academy, and since I finally got to meet you in person, allow me to thank you on it's behalf."
Her manner of speaking and facial expression completely threw me off. She tanked me but everything from her tone of voice to her expression told me that she really didn't care all the much. Ignoring all these thoughts, I said: "I was just lucky. Do you think it's possible for me to speak with Anise for a minute? I just want to ask her something.".
The woman thought for a moment before saying: "I can't intervene in the program of the teachers here, but since we owe you a few favors and my daughter said you wanted to learn magic, how about listening in to her class while you wait for her?"
I didn't think I needed it, but the idea of observing how they go about teaching magic here intrigued me, so I nodded and said: "I would love to."
Anise's mother turned towards the guard and said: "Take him to Matilda's class and explain my decision to her, but take care not to disturb it too much." After giving instructions to the guard, she turned back towards me and continued: "I have some things to take care of. Please try not to disturb the class and just listen quietly.". With that, she turned around and just left. I didn't think I saw a single change in her expression the entire conversation.
The guard wiped the sweat that formed on his brow and told me to follow after him before stepping inside. He lead me through a couple of hallways, to a normal looking door with the words 'WATER' written on it. The guard knocked once on the door before opening it and stepping inside. I followed after him and noticed that there were about a hundred or so students, all looking curiously at us. The guard ignored the looks and whispered something into the teacher's ear.
The teacher nodded and motioned for the guard to leave before saying to me: "Go and take a seat wherever you want, but be careful not to disturb my class."
I nodded and walked towards the seats. While I was looking for a place to sit, I noticed Anise signaling for me to stay next to her.
Seeing that I found a seat, the teacher continued her lecture.
Once I sat down, I turned towards Anise and was about to whisper something, when I saw her turn towards me and shake her head. Since I couldn't speak to her, I looked back at the teacher and listened to her lecture.
She was explaining some basic knowledge about ice, how it's formed, some proprieties and other stuff like that. It sounded like basic second grade science knowledge, some of it was even wrong.
'I see what you meant, Ai. If this is their level of knowledge, I can understand why silent casting is such a big deal.'
I kept listening, but I soon got really bored so I asked Ai to show me some books to read until the end of the lecture. Two hours later, class was finally over and the teacher left the room, together with the other student.
Anise turned towards me and said with a smile: "How did you get in here?"
"I met you mother when I came to visit you and she offered to let me listen in to one of your classes."
"Oh, that happened. So? What do you think?"
"About?"
"About your first magic class, of course."
An awkward expression appeared on my face as I replied: "Let's just say it could have been better."
She looked at me in confusion and said: "What do you mean? Miss Matilda is a Master Magician specializing in water."
"Sigh.. Remember when I told you that in the world I came from, magic was replaced by science?", seeing her nod, I continued: "Well, what she was just explaining is a part of science. Also, even eight year old kids back on Earth know more about water than her."
She appeared amazed after hearing my words and said: "Are you serious? But she spent years of her life studying water and understanding it, how could an eight year kid know more?"
"All I know is that the level of knowledge of this world is a pitiful level. It probably has to do with magicians only studying things related to the element they have an affinity with and not showing any interest in other domains. Let me ask you something, do you know when water becomes ice?"
"Yes, when it's very cold."
"Okay, but why does it become ice when exposed to cold?"
"Erm.. Because it freezes?"
"That is true, but what happens to water, when exposed to cold, that causes it to freeze."
"… I don't know."
"Let me tell you: The molecules get so cold that they slow down enough to hook onto each other and form a solid crystal. That is why water passes from it's liquid state to it's solid state."
"Molecules? What are those?"
"Molecules are a group of two or more atoms held together by chemical bonds, while atoms are the smallest unit of matter."
She looked even more confused now so I sighed and said: "It's normal that you will not understand. Learning science is like building a huge tower. You must start from the bottom, building your foundation before slowly continuing up. You, trying to understand what I'm saying is like trying to build the rooftop before even starting on the foundation."
"I see.. I understand." She replied, taking a break before continuing with a downcast look: "It's just that I never imagined that we could be so behind compared to your original world."
"Hey, no need to feel down. This world will slowly reach the same level. It's not like people on my world were born like this. They slowly learned and passed on that knowledge to the next generation."
She nodded weakly, but soon, an idea seem to come to her as she grabbed my hand and said in an excited manner: "How about you teach us? We could both talk with mother and convince her to let you teach here."
A teaching job didn't sound all that bad, but I had no time for it.
"I'm sorry, Anise, but I don't have the time to sit around and teach science to everyone. I need to get stronger."
She didn't even appear to have heard my answer as she continued to look at me with big puppy eyes.
"Anise, there are some things I can't tell you but I really have no time to sit here and play teacher."
She finally appeared to have given up and nodded weekly. "I understand. I got a little too excited there. You are free to do whatever you want and I can't force you to do something you don't like.". I could see the disappointment in her eyes, but there was nothing I could do about it. Trying to change the subject, I said:
"Actually, I came here to ask you if you were free tomorrow."
"Free? I have some classes but no other plans. Why?"
"I wanted to take a break tomorrow before going on another quest and wondered if you would come with me on a walk around the city."
She pondered for a moment before saying: "I'll have to ask mother about it, but there shouldn't be any problem. At what hour do you want me to come to the city?"
"I'll come pick you up in the morning."
She looked at me weirdly but still nodded in the end.
"All right. I'll go now since I came straight here and still need to go to the adventurer guild to complete the quest."
"Oh right. I forgot to ask, how did the quest go?"
"It was fine, I'll tell you more about it tomorrow."
"Okay. Let me walk you to the game." She said as we both made our way towards the city gate. Once there, we said our goodbyes and I went towards the city.
I walked on foot until I was a safe distance away, before casting Zephyr and riding towards Cloven City at full speed.
Reaching the city, I canceled the spell and went to the adventurer guild. I passed the goblin ears to the clerk and picked up what amounted to almost three gold coins. After checking up the quest board, I walked back to my inn and laid down in my room, staring at the ceiling.
[*Thinking about the date with your little girlfriend tomorrow?*]
'Not really. I was wondering if I could help them by teaching science more than I can do on my own.'
[*I don't understand why are you mulling about this. You have no obligation to teach them anything and it's also a lot more boring than adventuring through the world.*]
'You're right about that, but I have no problem teaching them. The problem is that I have no time for that.'
[*Why is that?*]
'Oh, right. You don't know. Ai, is it okay to let her know about it?'
[There is no problem.]
'Share the information with her, please. It will go faster this way.'
After a period of silence, Senna's voice sounded in my head again.
[*I see. I never imagined that He will do something so stupid.*] I could actually hear a bit of blame and sadness in her voice.
'Why do you say that?'
[*There are some things that you are too weak to understand now. Little girl, how many material planes did He bring under the Fate System?*]
[All of them.]
[*That's bad. What about new ones, created after he left.*]
[They will join as soon as they are created.]
[*Why would he.. Never mind, I understand. Well, good luck taking care of this mess kiddo.*] I think I felt a trace of pity from her voice.
'What are you two talking about?'
[*Doesn't matter. I'm going to sleep. See you later, Ethan.*]
'Ai, what's wrong with her?'
[I don't know.]
'Hmm' I put these thoughts in the back of my mind started thinking of an offensive spell I could use. A few moments later, I asked Ai:
'Ai, there is no lightning affinity, is there?'
[Everyone's mana has an easier time taking the form of some of the basic elements and the people of this word called this propriety affinity. Your mana has all affinities so it can take the form of lightning as well, even if no one had done it before.]
'Hmm… Are you telling me that the people of this world don't know about lightning?'
[They do, but since electricity is not a thing, plasma was probably also not discovered, making creating and manipulating lightning an impossibility for them.]
'Oh, I also don't know that much about it, can you compile all the information I need to be able to create lightning for me to study?'
Lines upon lines of text appeared in my vision shortly after. I closed my eyes and started my homework.
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